The Rise and Decline of Western Liberalism [antikvár]

Preface The origins of this book go back more years than I care to remember. My original intention was to write a book about Cold War liberalism — at that time a more influential intellectual current than it is now. As will be seen, this makes up only a small ingredient in the present work. I then had the idea of writing an analytical study of liberalism, but became convinced that a completely ahistorical analysis was also inadequate. Hence the present hybrid volume, which attempts to combine analysis with criticism and history. The result is a book which is longer than I would have liked, for who, after all, has the time to read long books? Considering its scope, however, and the range and complexity of the materials I felt had to be considered, experts in any of the several fields into which I have trespassed will be more likely to complain of its brevity and superficiality. Even so, of course, it is in no way comprehensive in its coverage. What I am offering is a perspective on, or an interpretation of, liberalism as a whole, which I have tried to support with enough argument, analysis, evidence and example to make it plausible. To adapt G. K. Chesterton, my excuse is that this was worth doing, however sketchily, rather than it not being done at all — and in fact full-scale studies of liberalism are remarkably thin on the ground at present. This interpretation will not please everyone, and certainly some liberals will be unhappy with it. But the fact is that much ofthe analysis and history of liberalism has been written by the liberals themselves. Liberalism has therefore had, in my view, a rather better press than it deserves. I have therefore wanted to tip the balance the other way by bringing out some of those darker and harsher aspects of liberalism which liberal writers have naturally tended to gloss over.